Falling into You (Falling #1)(3)

My mind spun back to Kyle. To his sudden, extreme reaction to Jason having asked me out. To the way he’d looked at me in the tree.

To my own reaction to his “why not” comment.

Why not? That’s the best he could come up with? I was angry all over again, and I couldn’t stop it, even though I knew it was irrational. I didn’t want him to want to go out with me just because. I wanted it to mean something.

I tried to picture being with Kyle as more, whatever that meant. I could easily picture our fingers tangled together. Candlelit dinners. My face on his chest, his lips descending to mine as the sun set behind us…

I told myself to quit being so melodramatic. But…I couldn’t shake the image. I could almost feel Kyle’s arms on my back, his hands spanning my waist, brushing dangerously close to my butt. I could feel the secret thrill of wanting his hands to move just a little lower. I could almost feel his lips, warm and soft and wet, slipping over mine…

I blushed and squirmed on the bed, rolling to my back and wiping my face.

What was wrong with me? I was fantasizing about Kyle, all of a sudden?

I needed to get outside. I needed to run. I stripped out of my school clothes and put on my running shorts, sports bra and tank top, ankle socks, Nikes, and grabbed my iPod. Running usually cleared my head, and that was what I needed right then.

I stuck the earbuds in my ears as I descended the stairs and rushed out the front door, pretending I couldn’t hear my mom calling my name. I put on my running playlist, all the silly, empty, upbeat pop songs that I could push to the back of my head and just run. I stretched briefly and took off, heading for my usual five mile circuit.

I passed Kyle’s driveway and mentally cursed myself for not thinking. He was waiting for me, his own earbuds in, shirtless in gym shorts. I’d seen him like this a thousand times, his sculpted abs rippling in the sun, a dark line of hair running down his stomach and disappearing beneath his shorts. This time, though, I had to swallow hard at the sight. I mean, I knew Kyle was hot. I’d always known that about him, and always appreciated it. I mean, I was a normal, hormonal sixteen year-old girl with a healthy appreciation for a sexy male body. I just hadn’t really thought about Kyle in that way. Like, as an object of desire.

I didn’t slow down, though, and he fell into step next to me, our footsteps syncing naturally. Even the two-step rhythm of inbreath-outbreath synced immediately.

We didn’t speak, didn’t even look at each other. We just ran. A mile, then the second, and then we both started to flag. I pushed the pace and he matched it, and then pushed it even faster, and then we had our second wind. We blew past the gnarled tree stump that marked the third mile, breathing hard now, sweating. I forced my gaze to the road ahead, forced my thoughts to emptiness, Lady Gaga in the background. Run, run, run, breathe and focus, swing my arms. Don’t look at Kyle. Don’t look at the sheen of sweat on his bare chest, don’t watch the bead of liquid trickling over one nipple and under the bulge of his pectoral, don’t imagine myself licking the droplet away as it touched the rippling field of his abs.

Shit! Where did that image come from? Licking him? Get a grip, Nell. Get a damn grip. The self-admonishment didn’t help. The image was burned into my brain, now. Kyle, on his back, in a grass field. Sweat running over his bronze skin, hair messy and wet. Lowering my face to his chest, pressing my lips to his breastbone, then licking away a glinting bead of salty liquid.

Oh god, oh god…ohmigod. This was bad. These weren’t good thoughts. Weren’t innocent thoughts. Weren’t BFF thoughts. I was a virgin. I’d never licked anyone. Never kissed anyone, even. Sure, I’d watched a few steamy rated-R movies with Jill and Becca, and we secretly watched True Blood together all the time. So…we knew how it was supposed to go, and I’d had my own little fantasies and girly daydreams, but…with Kyle?

I was just channeling Sookie and Eric. Obviously. Except Kyle looked more like Bill…

I jolted back to awareness, and Kyle was a few steps behind me, and I was full-out running, arms pumping wildly. I pushed harder, ran faster, pushing the images and the sudden ridiculous desire for my best friend away, and just ran. Legs turned jelly, breathing ragged and burning, vision blurring, desperation in place of blood, confusion in place of oxygen, that kind of running.

Kyle slid into my peripheral vision, pacing me, straining, then his conditioning took over and he peeled away, faster than I could ever hope to run. All-state football star at sixteen fast. Already being scouted by U of M and Alabama and UNC fast.

I stumbled, slowed, stopped, then slumped forward with my hands on my knees, panting. Kyle was a dozen feet away, doing the same. We were on the crest of a hill, the forest out to our left, our houses a few miles behind us, the ridge with our tree visible off to our right. Wildflowers swayed in a breeze, welcome and cool in the early September evening heat. I made myself walk around, forgot myself and peeled my tank top off and wiped my face with it.

I stopped walking again, head tipped back, trying to slow my breathing, tilted my head back and draped the shirt over my eyes to sop up the burning sweat from my forehead.

“You should stretch out,” Kyle murmured, only inches away.

I started at the sound of his voice, his sudden proximity. My heart started pounding again, nerves this time rather than exertion. Which was stupid. This was Kyle. He knew everything about me. He’d seen me naked.